Sometimes the very contours of a restaurant sign tell a story about an earlier business. Shalimar, in San Francisco, serves no alcohol, but it's clear that for at least one previous tenant, cocktails were a specialty. Punjabi Kitchen's pole-mounted sign, though repainted, retains the leaflike shape once favored by a national chain and complements the barnlike double pitch of the roof. If only the restaurant served kulfi with a cherry dip!

Perhaps the cafe has a sidewalk permit, and perhaps you could sit outside, but isn't the fully shaded windowside two-top far more attractive? This table and chair, partially exposed to the harsh late-morning light, seem to have a different function. From a distance, they're easier to "read" than any hand-chalked signboard: brunch is served.

On my recent visit to Mexico City, I ate precisely one Chinese meal, notable less for the food itself than for the Dongbei heritage of the cooks. Although I never set foot inside Kong Ming — typical for CDMX, the menu was Cantonese — I did add its likeness to the Chinese Restaurant Worldwide Documentation Project. In all, I photographed 17 Mexico City restaurants for the photo pool, 11 of which identify their cuisine with an immediacy that rivals pandas and bamboo. Even when the restaurant name is writ small, as at Kong Ming, those red lanterns send their signal.

Yakshas are members of "a broad class of nature-spirits ... in Hindu, Jain and Buddhist literature." They may be male or female; many are benevolent, even mischievous. In Thailand, however, where statues of yakshas guard the gates to many Buddhist temples, generally they are given a fearsome appearance that includes bulging eyes, protruding fangs, and what appears to be a stafflike weapon, but perhaps is a massive sword not yet drawn from its sheath.

This Bayside, Queens, mural portrays the architecture of Bangkok against the skyline of New York, much as the restaurant's name combines BK and NY. Also juxtaposing East and West: A towering yaksha guarding a humble parking-lot service door, and a "weapon" that, on close inspection, is nothing more than a gaily painted drainpipe.

A is not for "apartment house" with a commercial tenant tucked in the prow; A is for "Aztec architecture" enlivened by a chile-pepper apostrophe. As you've guessed, the deli counter focuses on Mexican fare. (A supplemental menu offers Dominican lunch specials, also prepared by an able hand; shards of concon, hidden behind the counter, await those who know to ask.) The edifice of my torta de lengua con todo ($7), a beef tongue sandwich with the works, was demolished in short order.

The tiled entryway to this Mexican-American snack shop bears a well-worn name with Eastern European roots. "J" might be "John": The July 1919 issue of the trade journal Western Druggist mentions a John Stuchlik and a W.A. Stuchlik, both of Chicago. A century ago, instead of paletas and fresh-cut tropical fruit, this corner was probably home to a pharmacy, and perhaps a drugstore soda fountain, too.

When it answered to the British-styled name Greenfield Chemist, you might have conceivably (if not privately) washed down your pills with a soda at the lunch counter. The old signage, on the wall that overlooks the Cortelyou Rd. station for the Q train, hasn't faded all that much over the years; the second, closeup, photo was taken in much brighter sunlight. Mr. Greenfield, I was told by a successor owner, retired in 1978, but it's unclear how soon afterward that the luncheonette was 86'ed.